Hajji Firuz Tepe

Hajji Firuz Tepe

Shown within Iran
Location	Iran
Region	West Azarbaijan province
Coordinates	36°59′40″N 45°28′28″E / 36.9944°N 45.4744°E / 36.9944; 45.4744
Type	tell
Length	200 metres (660 ft)
Width	140 metres (460 ft)
Height	10.3 metres (34 ft)
History
Periods	Neolithic, Chalcolithic, Late Bronze Age/Iron Age, Islamic
Site notes
Excavation dates	1936, 1958, 1960, 1961, 1968
Archaeologists	A. Stein, C. Burney, T. Cuyler Young Jr., R.H. Dyson, Mary M. Voigt

Hajji Firuz Tepe is an archaeological site located in West Azarbaijan province in north-western Iran. The site was excavated between 1958 and 1968 by archaeologists from the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. The excavations revealed a Neolithic village that was occupied in the second half of the sixth millennium BC where some of the oldest archaeological evidence of grape-based wine was discovered in the form of organic residue in a pottery jar.

Hajji Firuz Tepe was first noted in 1936 by Sir Aurel Stein, who collected pottery sherds from the surface of the site. The site was more thoroughly investigated between 1958 and 1968, when four excavation seasons took place as part of the larger Hasanlu Project conducted by the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. The site was originally selected in order to investigate the early periods that had been attested in the occupation sequence of nearby Hasanlu. These excavations were supervised by Charles Burney (1958, 1961), T. Cuyler Young Jr. (1961) and Robert H. Dyson and Mary M. Voigt (1968). During these seasons, excavation squares were opened in four different parts of the site, with the largest exposure being reached on the north-eastern slope of the mound.

Hajji Firuz Tepe lies in the Gadar River valley in West Azarbaijan province, north-western Iran. It is a tell, or settlement mound, of roughly oval shape measuring 200 by 140 metres (660 by 460 ft) at its base and reaching an elevation of 10.3 metres (34 ft) above the plain, but archaeological deposits also continue to an unknown depth below the modern surface of the plain. The plain in which Hajji Firuz Tepe is located lies in the north-western part of the Zagros Mountains at an elevation of 1,300–1,350 metres (4,270–4,430 ft) amsl. The Gadar River flows through it toward the east to eventually end in marshes bordering Lake Urmia. The area is an important crossroads, with routes leading in all directions, including an easy route toward the west, crossing the Zagros Mountains via Rowanduz and Arbil toward the Mesopotamian Plains. The Gadar River valley falls within both the modern and ancient distribution zones of the wild grape (Vitis vinifera subsp. sylvestris) and of the terebinth.